Gerry Wright (biochemist)
| Gerry Wright | |
|---|---|
| Native name | Gerard D. Wright |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Fields | Biochemistry |
| Institutions | McMaster University |
| Education | University of Waterloo (BSc 1986, PhD 1990) |
| Thesis | Investigation of the lanosterol 14[alpha]-demethylase (P-450₁₄DM)) from Saccharomyces cerevisiae (1990) |
| Known for | Antibiotic research[1] |
Gerard D. "Gerry" Wright, PhD, FRSC, is a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, and Canada Research Chair in Antibiotic Biochemistry at McMaster University[2] who studies chemical compounds that can combat antibiotic resistance in bacteria.[3][4][5] He is also an Associate member of the Departments of Chemistry and Chemical Biology and Pathology and Molecular Medicine. Wright was Chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences from 2001-2007 before becoming the Director of McMaster's Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research. He is founding director of the McMaster Antimicrobial Research Centre, and co-founder of the McMaster High Throughput Screening Facility.
Wright obtained his BSc in Biochemistry and his PhD in Chemistry from the University of Waterloo. He did his post-doctoral training at Harvard Medical School before joining McMaster University in 1993.
Wright is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the American Academy of Microbiology. He currently serves as an associate editor of ACS Infectious Diseases, and he is a member of the editorial boards of Chemistry and Biology, The Journal of Antibiotics, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, and Antimicrobial Therapeutics Reviews.
Wright coined the term antibiotic resistome, which is used to describe the collection of all the antibiotic resistant genes and their precursors in both pathogenic and non-pathogenic bacteria.[6]
In 2014, Wright was the senior author on a study in Nature which described the discovery that the previously known Aspergillomarasmine A was a new antibiotic.[1][7][8]
References
- 1 2 Crowe, Kelly (25 June 2014). "Antibiotic-resistant bacteria disarmed with fungus compound". CBC News. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ "Gerry's Bio". Thewrightlab.com. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ Waters, Hannah (25 April 2011). "Drugs boost antibiotic function". The Scientist. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ "Unravelling the secrets of the superbugs". Hamilton Spectator. 24 October 2013. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ "Canada Research Chair in Molecular Studies of Antibiotics". McMaster University. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ↑ Sello, Jason K. (October 2012). "Mining the Antibiotic Resistome". Chemistry & Biology 19 (10): 1220–1221. doi:10.1016/j.chembiol.2012.10.005.
- ↑ King, Andrew M.; Reid-Yu, Sarah A.; Wang, Wenliang; King, Dustin T.; De Pascale, Gianfranco; Strynadka, Natalie C.; Walsh, Timothy R.; Coombes, Brian K.; Wright, Gerard D. (25 June 2014). "Aspergillomarasmine A overcomes metallo-β-lactamase antibiotic resistance". Nature 510 (7506): 503–506. doi:10.1038/nature13445. PMID 24965651.
- ↑ Yang, Jennifer (25 June 2014). "Superbug NDM-1’s antibiotic foe may lie in a handful of soil". Toronto Star. Retrieved 19 August 2015.